Cardinal Pell's smear claim doesn't stand up to scrutiny

 

 

Cardinal George Pell in The Australian 13 November 2012

 

In November 2012 Cardinal George Pell attacked a ''persistent press campaign'' and ''general smears that we are covering up and moving people around'', and suggested that abuse by Catholic priests had been singled out and exaggerated.

However, his statements do not sit easily with the historical record.

Brisbane Times 16 November 2012:

 

THE Catholic Church has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on legal fees to defend priests and brothers who have already been tried and convicted of serious sexual assaults against children in their care.

A Fairfax Media investigation has revealed that at least two Catholic orders have continued to fund the legal defences of some of their religious members as they went to trial for the second, third and even fourth time for the sexual abuse of children.

This includes the funding of multiple appeals, hiring top barristers who charge thousands of dollars a day, and hiring private investigators.

In some cases the result has been that criminal prosecutions and the victims of abuse are dragged through the courts for many years.

 

This is the opening paragraph of a 1998 appeal judgement in R v Best in which the court directed that a new trial of the applicant be had:

 

CALLAWAY, J.A.: The applicant, who is now aged 57, pleaded not guilty in the County Court at Melbourne to a presentment containing 18 counts of indecent assault on a male person under the age of 16 contrary to s.68(3A) of the Crimes Act 1958 as it stood at the time of the alleged offences. They related to five boys, who were pupils at a Christian Brothers primary school of which the applicant was the principal. I shall call them "M", "K", "D", "W" and "B". After a trial occupying 13 days the jury returned verdicts of guilty on counts 4 to 7, which related to K, and counts 12 and 13, which related to D. The applicant was acquitted on the remaining counts. The verdicts of not guilty on counts 8 (one of several counts relating to M) and 16 to 18 (three of four counts relating to B) were unanimous. All the other verdicts were by majority. On 27th March 1998 the learned trial judge heard a plea for leniency, following which the applicant was sentenced to nine months' imprisonment on each count. His Honour directed that three months of each of the sentences imposed on counts 5 to 7, 12 and 13 be served cumulatively upon each other and upon the sentence imposed on count 4, making a total effective sentence of 24 months' imprisonment. The return of prisoners does not include the words "upon each other and", but the sense is clear from the specification of the total effective sentence. Twelve months of that sentence were suspended for an operational period of three years. The applicant seeks leave to appeal against both conviction and sentence.

Geelong Advertiser June 2011:

The Christian Brothers yesterday also confirmed it had forked out millions of dollars for Best's long and drawn out trials where top barristers, that included Queen's Counsel and Senior Counsel, were hired to get him off dozens of charges.

It can now be revealed Best, who has close links to Cardinal George Pell, pleaded guilty this week to six sex abuse-related charges of three boys aged between 11 and 12.

 

According to The Age in August 2011:

 

Best has admitted 27 indecent assaults on 11 boys who attended schools at which he taught as a Christian Brother in Ballarat, at Box Hill in Melbourne and in Geelong.

He is already in jail serving four separate terms for indecent assaults against boys at his schools….

Detective Sergeant Carson is somewhat constrained in what he can say about the Best case by the law and the rules of his job.

But sometimes his sense of right and wrong combined with the tragedy of what has happened in a church he once respected, make it too difficult to stay within those bounds.

"Best got convicted for earlier crimes last December and the church knew that," he said.

"Yet the Catholic Church spent millions of dollars on this bloke's defence in his latest trials and did nothing for the victims."

 

Excerpt from a 2008 Supreme Court judgment in Tasmania v Ferguson:

79 Although C1 does not claim it, evidence is available from Father Jago that upon an indecent assault by the accused being reported to him by C1, Father Jago reported it to the school principal. However, prosecuting authorities were not informed. C1 says that he has been deeply affected by the sexual assaults he believes were committed on him by two of the teachers at the school and by the caretaker of the nearby oval. I conclude that it is in his interests and in the interests of the public, that his allegations, which are charged in count 1, should go to trial.

80 There is available evidence from C2 and Christopher Bartlett that C2, who was aged 13 at the time, complained to a prefect who in turn reported the matter to the school principal. Although the report, along with all the other similar reports Father Hosie appears to have received, may have resulted in the accused being quickly transferred in his employment to another place, with the protection of the school's reputation seemingly gaining prominence, the alleged conduct was not reported to the police as it should have been at the time. There is no evidence that C2 was permanently and adversely affected by the one indecent assault that he alleges took place. Nevertheless, he reported it at the time to a responsible person and it was in no way his fault that his report was not passed on to the police. It is in the interests of the public that his allegations should go to trial.

81 Although C3 says that he did not report to the school's principal the sexual assaults he says were committed against him by the accused, he reported to the principal on the following morning the incident he witnessed that involved the accused sexually misbehaving in the presence of boys in his room. He says that for his pains the principal accused him of lying. He was deterred from reporting the sexual assaults upon himself. Even his father was reluctant to listen to him. His explanation for not reporting the matters to the police until 2004 was that he had spent 30 years being upset by it but he had not been game enough to do so. It was only as a result of the police contacting him that he eventually told them about what he says occurred. It is in the interests of the public and in his interests that his allegations should go to trial.

82 C5 says that he made no report of the crimes committed by the accused against him, either to the school, his parents or anyone else for over 30 years. He believes that many of his life problems, such as alcohol and drugs, and his offending, stemmed from the accused's sexual assaults upon him. It was not until 2002 that he told anyone about them. Subsequently, the police approached him, it would seem as a result of his opening up to others. It is in the interests of the public and in his own interests that his allegations should be allowed to go to trial.

83 C6's allegations are extremely serious ones. They include oral sex, attempted anal sex and urinating on him. He says that he was also the subject of sexual assaults by another teacher. He says that after the first occasion of being assaulted by the accused he was crying in the dormitory and the teacher-in-charge told him to stop blubbering. He was 12 years old at the time. Thereafter the assaults continued for a time and he felt unable to tell anyone of what had happened. It is an all too typical account of child sexual abuse. It appears that his report to the police only came about following his breaking down earlier this year and telling his wife about what had occurred. It is in the public interest and in his interests that his allegations should be allowed to go to trial.

 

ABC News December 2007:

 

70 year old former priest convicted of maintaining a sexual relationship with a person under the age of 17 has been jailed in the Launceston Criminal Court.

Gregory Laurence Ferguson was sentenced today to three years imprisonment with an 18 month non-parole period.

Ferguson sexually abused a 12 year old boarder at Burnie's Marist College in 1970, when he was a teacher and priest there.

Ferguson was convicted on two other sexual abuse charges earlier this year, and was jailed for two years.

He now has a total of five years imprisonment, with a minimum non-parole period of two and half years.

 

ABC News February 2008:

 

72-year-old Roger Michael Bellemore has been sentenced to four years imprisonment, with a two-year non-parole period.

Bellemore sexually abused three male students when he was a teacher, priest and football coach at Marist.

Justice Ewan Crawford said Bellemore had used his superiority to have his way with the boys.

One of Bellemore's victims was 11 at the time he was assaulted in 1966.

 

The Age July 2004:

 

In his first interview since allegations against the Salesians surfaced worldwide, Father Murdoch revealed that he made two trips to Rome to persuade the Vatican to expel David Rapson, who had been sentenced to two years' jail in 1992 for sex abuse of a 15-year-old student at the Salesian school Rupertswood, near Sunbury.

Father Murdoch also revealed that he had prevented a former head of the order, Father Julian Fox, from returning from Rome to Australia unless he agreed to face his accusers in a case of alleged sexual assault.

The Salesians also paid $35,600 compensation following sex abuse allegations against Father Fox.

The New Zealand Herald April 2006:

With the 21 guilty verdicts in a four-week trial that ended in Christchurch last month, and one guilty plea by McGrath as the trial began, it was now clear that he had not made full admissions in 1993.

McGrath was being sentenced on 13 charges of indecent assault, eight charges of inducing an indecent act, and one charge of doing an indecent act.

The offending related to nine victims at Marylands School where McGrath was a brother, teacher and housemaster. The victims were aged between 7 and 15 at the time.

The New Zealand Herald November 2012:

One was Brother Bernard McGrath, a New Zealander who has been convicted in both countries…….

McGrath was trained in Australia and sexually assaulted boys at the Kendall Grange boarding institution for the intellectually disabled, near Lake Macquarie, south of Newcastle. In 1986 he moved back to Christchurch, working at Marylands and the Hebron trust. In 1993 he was sentenced to three years' jail for abusing children at the two institutions.

Later, in Sydney, he was sentenced to nine months for abusing a pre-teen boy and in 2006 he was sentenced again in Christchurch to five years' jail on eight charges involving indecent assault.

News.com.au  November 2012:

 “There was one priest in Victoria who admitted when caught that he had confessed 200 times and nobody had reported him, because priests are not allowed to report anyone who confesses in a confessional."

Priests are not subject to mandatory reporting laws so they don't have to report child abusers who confess to them.

The Sun Herald November 2012:

 

A FORMER priest charged with sexually abusing seven boys over an 18-year period blamed God for making him do it, a court has been told.

David Rapson, 59, is charged with abusing the boys while teaching at Salesian College Rupertswood, in Sunbury, between 1973 and 1990.

The former college vice-principal is charged with one count each of rape and gross indecency and a string of indecent assault charges.